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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To expect my tenants to understand?

354 replies

Littleelffriend · 24/10/2017 18:45

I own a flat which I rent out. I wanted to sell it but no takers so I’m stuck . The rent doesn’t cover the mortgage but better than nothing. I got new tenants 5 months ago, lovely couple no issues.
Since they moved in there have been numerous problems. The roof started leaking, I got it fixed within 3 days. The cooker broke, I ordered them a new one straight away. They blocked the toilet with wipes, I paid for an emergency plumber the same day.
They called Friday and said they had no heating or hot water. I had an engineer out within 2 hours. He said he had to order a part which would be here today. It’s the wrong part, and it won’t be fixed until Friday now so a week of no heating or hot water. Totally shit, no argument from me. But my tenants are now being crap about it, going on about how frustrating it is. I know it’s frustrating, but these things happen and I’ve done my best. Aibu to wish they would be a bit more understanding?

OP posts:
Bubblebubblepop · 24/10/2017 20:37

It might be interesting frumpety, but it's not the same. Seeing as you don't live in a holiday rental or hotel

JonSnowsWife · 24/10/2017 20:40

Any legal action to force the contract to be fulfilled would've cost you a lot lot more time and money than the whole situation was worth.

Where did I mention legal action? There are steps before this. .

gingergenius · 24/10/2017 20:41

@frumpety - so if your boiler failed, in your own home, and a plumber wasn't available for a week, would you stay in a hotel or would you make the best of a bad situation, save yourself the cash, boil a kettle and chalk it up to a good dinner party anecdote?

The op has done everything she can.

ChocolateWombat · 24/10/2017 20:41

The point about a phone line going down, is that like a boiler failing, it sometimes takes a couple of days to get a workman out to it and it sometimes then takes a couple more days to be fixed. These are realities. The Internet company would not compensate for no internet for a week and a landlord would not need to compensate for no heating for a week if they have been working on getting it fixed and have be in clear communication about the matter.

It seems some people do have these 48 hour clauses in their contracts. Great. It would be j te resting to know how many do choose to go to alternative accommodation rather than just sit out an extra 48 hours in the cold. Obviously if the ceiling falls in or the whole property floods and is uninhabitable, people will need rehousing, but we are not talking about this scale.

Not having hot water is an annoyance clearly. It is not life threatening. Heaters have been offered and turned down. Speedy action has been taken and LL reasonable steps by the OP including being prepared to pay extra for speedier delivery of the part. She can tell her tenants all of that and have a clear conscience that she has been doing what is reasonable.

If the problem remains unresolved in another week (and we all know these things can drag on, even with the best will in the world and most dedicated attempts to sort them) then it might be right to be talking about compensation. At the moment though, the tenants have no particular time frame clauses in their contract and know the LL is working hard to make it all happen and have a date when the problem should be fixed. As I say, LL has fulfilled her responsibilities and can sleep easy about it. This is not the equivalent of the totally unacceptable examples given by tenants who waited 7 weeks or 3 months for hot water.

JonSnowsWife · 24/10/2017 20:41

Oh sorry @percephone I didnt see that one.

Urubu · 24/10/2017 20:42

It happend to us as tenants. Everything in the flat started breaking down suddenly, lights, door and window handles, shower...
The landlord was prompt in getting it fixed, communicated well with us, and came by at one point with a bottle of wine to apologize.
We were annoyed but understood it wasn't his fault - had he been slow to take action we would have been mad at hime but sometimes you have to accept there isn't anyone to blame.

Believeitornot · 24/10/2017 20:42

Well it’s their home. You own it but it’s their home.

If all of those things happened to me, I would be pretty annoyed.

Bubblebubblepop · 24/10/2017 20:44

Like what jonsnow? Are you going to enlighten us as to your magic powers?

LaurieFairyCake · 24/10/2017 20:44

A weeks delay to fix a boiler is reasonable

A week without hot water and having to have a sink wash when you’ve got a professional job or indeed any job is not acceptable.

^^ both of these can be true.

A week is way too long to be doing sink washes Shock - that’s proper minging

Dailystuck71 · 24/10/2017 20:44

I was annoyed when it happened to me believe but shit happens. It’s not ideal but it’s not life threatening and it being sorted.

RosyPony · 24/10/2017 20:46

I work in the industry, home owners are always happy to wait a (sensible) time for it to be fixed, tenants want it done yesterday. We had one ‘gentleman’ issue a formal complaint because we couldn’t source a part on a bank holiday!

It’s not like you aren’t doing anything, you’ve had engineer out and the part is on order, they’d be in the same position if they owned the flat.

scaryteacher · 24/10/2017 20:46

The landlords make out like bandits in Belgium. I had to wait for ceiling lights to be put in the bedrooms in our current rental, and even then,we had to supply and fit the lights....we were left with the wires with the ends clamped. The tenants pay for everything in Belgium that I pay for as a l/l in UK including buildings insurance!

Original poster
Littleelffriend · 24/10/2017 20:46

Ok I’m checking out, I think it’s becoming lls vs tenants. Thank you all

OP posts:
RosyPony · 24/10/2017 20:48

When I rented I had a lovely flat, one Christmas my cooker died (we were going to my then partners parents thankfully) and the next year the boiler died. Both took about a week to fix. I was just grateful I wasn’t the one footing the bill!

JonSnowsWife · 24/10/2017 20:49

Exactly @LaurieFairyCake.

No 'magic powers' bubble, just the righteous people contacted before escalating.

ChocolateWombat · 24/10/2017 20:49

URubu - a sensible and balanced post.
Of course tenants are annoyed by things breaking down. However tenants also need to know that there are ALWAYS possibilities of break downs even in the best maintained properties. It is reality and no-one is to blame. The response of the LL or their agent is their responsibility and something they can control. Knowing that the LL is acting swiftly and communicating what is happening doesn't remove all annoyance, but is means the service you have paid for is being provided.

Reasonable LLs maintain their properties so breakdowns are minimal (not zero) and act swiftly to deal with problems and communicate clearly about what is happening.
REasonable tenants look after the properties they are living in, speedily report problems and accept a reasonable time frame for repair.

Bubblebubblepop · 24/10/2017 20:49

Right. So you'd make a phone call.

Killer.

Witsender · 24/10/2017 20:50

Unless you have a magic wand you have done what you can.

JonSnowsWife · 24/10/2017 20:50

I think it’s becoming lls vs tenants

Because some people are saying it's not entirely unreasonable for the tenants to be a bit cross? Confused there's just as many people on the side of LL's.

LaurieFairyCake · 24/10/2017 20:50

Many many times a boiler has failed in my life in my own home (I’m old).

I have : gone to stay with family, gone to the local swimming baths at 6am for a week til the boiler was fixed, boiled literally a hundred kettles to have a bath and give my children a bath, stayed in a cheap B and B.

All of these options I have done. It has never been an option to turn up at my job not fully clean and presentable. I totally disagree that sink washes are fine. I wasn’t that keen on them in the early 70’s when I was just a child and didn’t sweat.

In a rented home I’d want the landlord to bear some of the extra cost of doing the above - so extra kettles, money for the swimming baths, or electric heaters.

brasty · 24/10/2017 20:51

I do wonder OP how well you are actually maintaining the house to stop problems happening in the first place? That is a lot of things to go wrong. For example, roof leaking - unless there has been a storm any loose tiles should be fixed before they cause a problem.

TheWK · 24/10/2017 20:53

I rent out property too

My take on issues like this are that the landlord:

  1. Get's on the case and sorts out issues like this asap
  1. If there is no hot water (or heating in winter) I refund 100% of the rent pro rata for the period it is unavailable for more than a day. Luckily that's only happened twice in 20 years, probably due to good maintenance and buying decent boilers/ having back ups

You can't take the rent and not provide habitable accommodation...that's the deal.

Too many landlords forget that

JonSnowsWife · 24/10/2017 20:54

Right. So you'd make a phone call.

Killer.

Yes bubble you can stop being a goady fucker now.

Bubblebubblepop · 24/10/2017 20:56

I'm not being a GF. I asked you how that clause would be enforced if the all was UNABLE to fix the boiler in 72 hours. I'm struggling to understand why you can't explain, for all your bravado when posting.

frumpety · 24/10/2017 20:56

I was just musing over the different accommodation expectations people have ginger , if you live in something for six months , you are expected to have a laissez faire attitude about not having access to hot water for a week , but if you rent accommodation for a week , well people expect it to be perfect .

Does that mean you would be quite happy with hotel accommodation that didn't offer the basic services you expected ? You would honestly just shrug and get the travel kettle and flannel out ?